Time to get all my strength back....badgerdave's westside journal

[BadgerDave]

If any of you saw my last thread (http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=2486211) you know that lately I've been struggling with my lifts. I've lost strength due to an obsession with ripped abs and low body fat. Enough! I hate feeling weaker and I'll sacrifice the ripped look for being bigger. So I've decided to train harder, and cut most of the cardio.

First, some background info about me. My name is Dave, I'm 19 going into 20 in 3 months. I'm about to finish my last week of college at UW-Oshkosh and I'll be attending UW-Madison in the fall. I played 4 years of football and baseball in high school. Started lifting my freshmen year and I fell in love with it. I was pound for pound the strongest kid on the football team since I outlifted some linemen twice my size. I've tried many workouts, from power lifting, to starr's 5x5, to the body splits (waste of time).

I'm 5'10, 165 lbs. My maxes as of right now are somewhere around:
Bench: 245x5
Incline: 215x4
Squat: 315x5
Deadlift: 305x5
Rows: 190x5

All those lifts used to be higher. My bench by 20 lbs, and my squat by 50 lbs...lol. As you can see there's a big problem with that. But enough is enough, time to train harder, eat more, and get a special kick.

That special kick is Swole V3.....I had great results with V2 before my senior football season, so I'm gonna use this to try to get back to the top.

I will be working out on Monday, tuesday, thursday, and friday. Cardio on wednesday and saturday.....haven't decided if hiit or low intensity.

I will be doing a modified version of Defranco's and Vikingman's Westside. This is what I'll be doing at least for the first few weeks:

Monday: Upper ME
Bench Press, work up to 3-5rm
Incline Bench 3-4x6-10
Bent-over rows 4x8-10
Dips 3-4x8-15
Pull-ups 3-4x12-15
weighted abs 3-4x8-15

Tuesday: DL ME
Deadlift 3-5rm
Squat 3-4x8-10
Lunges 4x8-10
Weighed Hypers 4x10-15
Calf Raises 5x10-12

Thursday: Rep Upper
Bench: Rep effort
Military 3-4x8-10
Rows 4x8-10
CGBP 4x8-10
Curls 4x8-10
Ab circuit training

Friday: Squat ME
Squat 3-5rm
SLDL 3-4x8-10
Split-legged squats 4x8-10
Weighted Hypers 4x10-15
Calf Raises 5x10-12

My diet will be about 3000-3500 cal/day. I'm not gonna obsess with my diet though. I'll just make sure I eat enough and get at least 200 g of protein.


If any of you have any suggestions on anything, please feel encouraged to tell me. Any modifications to that program that you think would be useful will be appreciated too.

With that being said, time to go to bed. Tomorrow's a big day, first day of WS and first day taking Swole V3

[pu12en12g]

Nice !

[BadgerDave]

First workout in about 4 hours...im pumped!

[BadgerDave]

Time to start...

Wow did I feel strong today in the weight room. Great workout! Part of that might be the mental part of knowing that Swole will help me out a bit. Although I felt a bit nauseous towards the end of my workout so I had to cut out the abs. I'll do that tomorrow with my lower body.

So here's my workout.....ate my protein bar 45 mins before lifting and took swole 20 mins before.

Bench: 45x10, 135x10, 155x8, 185x6, 205x5, 225x3, 245x5
Incline: 165x8, 175x8, 185x6, 185x6
Rows: 135x8, 145x8, 155x5, 165x8
Dips: bw+50lbs x8, bw+50x8, bw+50x8, bw+50x8 (suppersetted with pull-ups)
Pull-ups: bwx10, bwx10, bwx10, bwx10

-As I said, I felt nauseous towards the dips/pull-ups part of the workout so that may have affected my output.
-245x5 on bench tied my max for now....although the dude spotting me touched the bar on the 4th and 5th he claims he didnt do anything and that he was just there in case I needed the help. So I got no way of knowing. Think I'll take his word and try for 250x5 next monday. Or should I do 245x5 again?
-Incline was solid, could have got a couple more reps in last set, but everyone was gone so I had no spotter....I'll up the reps next week with a spotter.
-Definitely got an amazing pump. When I looked in the mirror before showering I felt huge lol. Love it.

[BadgerDave]

Just wondering...anyone reading this?

Any feedback on the program or anything?

[just pushit]

just started ereading it now looking good so far if you can get the 245 for 5 screw it and go for the 250 it wouldnt hurt and you wouldn't know if you could till you try don't be afraid to try and go heavier, just know your limits and break them bro

[BadgerDave]

Just got back from lifting. Here's today's workout:

Deadlift: 45x10, 135x10, 185x8, 205x6, 225x5, 275x3, 305x5
Squats: 225x10, 250x8, 275x8, 275x8
Lunges: 95x10, 115x10, 135x10
Hypers: bw+25x15, bw+25x15, bw+25x15, bw+25x15
Standing Calf Raises: 285x12, 305x12, 325x12, 335x10, 335x10
Weighted Sit-ups: bw+25x25, bw+25x25, bw+25x25, bw+25x25

-Overall a decent workout, but I didn't get a couple of things I wanted to.
-Wanted to go up to 300x8 on my last set of squats, but after the sets of 10 and 8....it drained me so 275x8 was already pretty tough.
-I was gonna do 4 sets of lunges, but I figured it's only an auxiliary lift and three sets did the work well
-Felt nauseous again, although when I do high reps of squats this tends to happen. I'll try to focus on my breathing while squatting. Also maybe eating my protein bar and taking swole a little earlier might help.
-I'll change the warm-up for deadlift. I think I made too small of weight increments at the beginning and then I made huge ones...like 225 to 275.
-Question for anyone who's done westside.....considering my max on squats is like 315x5 right now, should I be doing more, less, or is the weight I used for squats today good? Because I understand you don't want to go near your max on heavy deadlift day, right?

[BadgerDave]

wow definitely feel sore after today's workout. Next week should be a lot better after a week on swole and a week of eating a lot more.

[BadgerDave]

So I decided to just go with low intensity cardio. I went for a 2.2 mile run today at a nice and easy pace since it's such a nice day. Wouldn't have been able to do hiit....my legs are sore as sh*t from yesterday's workout.

[BadgerDave]

Anyone else reading this? j/w

Anyways, I'm debating on exactly what to do for RE upper tomorrow. I don't know if I should use 185 and do 3 sets with as many reps as possible or do 3/4 straight sets of 8-12. I've read other journals and people seem to pick different ones. I know Defranco recommends 185 and doing it max reps. What about vikingman? And what exactly does doing sets of 15-20 do for you....isn't that just muscular endurance?

Also, what do you guys think about my selection for the other lifts tomorrow? I chose CGBP instead of skullcrushers to work the chest a bit more. Good or bad? Or ditch it, add another chest auxiliar lift, and do skullcrushers?

Also thinking about adding pull-ups too....I'll see how much time it takes.

[BadgerDave]

Just uploaded a picture too....felt it'd give my journal a little more life lol.

[BadgerDave]

So I just got back from lifting and wow what a great workout I had. My whole upper body feels sore as sh*t.

I changed my workout a bid and added a couple of things, anyways, here it is:

Bench (RE)
45x10, 135x5, 185x17, 185x8, 185x6
DB Bench
65'sx8, 65'sx8, 70'sx8
Military
95x8, 95x8, 105x8, 105x8
Bent-Over Rows
135x8, 145x8, 155x8, 165x8
Pull-ups
bwx10, bwx10, bwx10
Tricep Pushdowns
150x8, 150x8, 150x8, 150x8
Barbell Curls
85x8, 85x8, 95x8, 95x7

- felt great throughout the whole workout. Didn't feel nauseous today.
- Triceps are dead...as are biceps. That's why I didn't do more weight for tricep pushdowns.
- The rep effort for bench killed me lol

- How does that RE for bench look? I mean, that's the correct way to do it according to Defranco, right? And yes I only took 60 sec breaks in between sets.

[BadgerDave]

anyone?

[BadgerDave]

I changed today's workout a bit too. Extra motivation today as I was pissed b/c my calculus final was bs....no one finished in time.

Squats ME
45x10, 135x10, 185x8, 225x6, 250x5, 275x3, 295x3, 315x5
SLDL
165x8, 175x8, 185x8, 205x8
Leg Press
300x15, 300x15, 300x15, 300x25
Hypers
bw+25x15, bw+25x15, bw+25x15, bw+25x15
Standing Calf Raises
305x12, 325x12, 335x12, 345x12, 355x12

-Leg press was done on a machine....at this place they don't have free weight leg press, but it's the last time I work out here so next week I'll do heavier leg press.
-Other than that good workout.